Settler Killed, Palestinian Wounded in Clash Over Land

By SERGE SCHMEMANN

Published: April 20, 1998

HEBRON, West Bank, April 19—
A small group of unarmed Palestinian shepherds confronted three Jewish settlers this morning on a rocky field that both sides claim as theirs, and in the ensuing fight one of the settlers was shot dead, another was wounded and one of the Arabs was severely wounded.

At day's end, that remained about all that Israeli investigators could establish with any certainty. No guns were found, and it was not clear how many were used.

The Israeli military commander in the Hebron area said that the Palestinian was in critical condition and was likely to die. But in fact he was conscious and was just then telling a reporter a story far different from those being told by Israelis.

The versions issued through the day by Israeli radio, Israeli politicians and Jewish settlers gave the impression that a fierce attack had been staged against the Jewish settlers.

Israel radio said a large band of Palestinians had ''infiltrated'' land belonging to the Jewish settlers, attacked the workers, snatched their weapons and fired at them. Israeli troops mounted a huge manhunt and promptly announced they had seized nine Bedouins, though later Israel radio said it was not certain whether they were involved.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at a joint news conference with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who was visiting, said: ''It was a very serious attack. A young man was killed in cold blood. It appears that this was an act of murder. We are verifying the details.''

At the funeral for the slain settler, Dov Driben, a 29-year-old father of three, in a desolate cemetery south of Hebron, fellow settlers and other right-wing nationalists depicted his death as a casualty in a brutal war.

''The attempt to present this as a shepherds' dispute is a major blow to Israeli national interests as well as to the truth,'' said Michael Kleiner, a member of Parliament. ''They came to kill him right next to his house. And if we don't know how to deal with it here, they will come looking for a place to herd near Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.''

The settlers themselves had differing versions of what happened. What nobody disputed was that Mr. Driben was a zealous religious nationalist who had joined with several other settlers to set up a ranch called Maon on a West Bank hilltop south of Hebron about a year ago, evidently without official permission.

Since then, the settlers had clashed repeatedly with Palestinians from the nearby village of Yatta over land near Maon that the settlers contended was state land and therefore theirs to use.

''All the Arabs in the area knew him,'' Efraim Hibsh, the leader of the local settlers' council, said of Mr. Driben. ''The struggle is a clear struggle. We fight here for every piece of land.''

Mr. Hibsh said that the Arab shepherds attacked ''our boys'' with sticks and stones and managed to seize two pistols from them before one of the settlers raced back to the settlement, fetched a weapon and opened fire.

Noam Federman, a spokesman for the Jewish settlers in Hebron, said Mr. Driben was working in the field when he was attacked by 8 or 10 Palestinians. Another settler came to his assistance. The second man was armed, Mr. Federman said, but was reluctant to use his pistol because he already faced charges of firing it in an inhabited area.

The Arabs seized the pistol and shot Mr. Driben, Mr. Federman said. Then a third settler rushed back and got his weapon and opened fire, hitting three or four Palestinians.

At the Alia Hospital in Hebron, doctors said that only one Palestinian had been admitted, with a bullet wound through the right side of the chest. The man, Moussa Khalil Dabadseh, a 33-year-old father of 12 from the village of Yatta, who works as a laborer in Jerusalem, recovered consciousness in the afternoon, and told his story.

He said his family had always farmed the land below Maon and had been battling the settlers over it for the last year. He said the dispute was currently in Israeli courts.

Speaking with obvious pain, and with long pauses, Mr. Dabadseh said he was grazing goats on the disputed land on Saturday when Mr. Driben, whom he knew from past confrontations, came and warned that if a single goat were still there on Sunday, he would kill Mr. Dabadseh.

At 9 A.M. today, Mr. Dabadseh said, he and ''some boys'' took their goats to the field. Suddenly Mr. Driben and two other settlers came and told Mr. Dabadseh to leave. Mr. Driben and Mr. Dabadseh began to fight.

''We were fighting and I heard Dov yell: 'Shoot him! Shoot him!' '' Mr. Dabadseh said, explaining that he knew Hebrew from his work. ''The other settler opened fire and injured Dov by mistake. He kept shooting. The same one shot him and shot me. I lost consciousness and only opened my eyes in the hospital.''

Mr. Dabadseh denied that he or the other Palestinians seized any guns.

In Hebron, Col. Yigal Sharon, the commander of Israeli troops in the area, acknowledged that the dispute had a history. Colonel Sharon also said that no other Palestinians were injured, and that only one holster was found, and none of the guns.

The second Israeli, who had come with a pistol, was in a hospital in Beersheba with a broken jaw, a concussion and a bullet wound. The third settler was not arrested and attended Mr. Driben's funeral, but refused to talk to reporters.

''We don't know yet exactly what happened there,'' Colonel Sharon said. ''We'll have to question the person injured, we'll have to interview witnesses, and only then can we get a picture.''